Perpetual Escapades: Our Neighborhood Market

Our market. Directly outside our neighborhood gate.

Where we regularly bought most of our food. Minus the raw meat.

Actually one of my favorite places to go, believe it or not. Absolutely loved people watching here (this goes both ways.... except they took it a few steps further to crowding around every transaction I made or piece of food I looked at), attempting conversations with the regular stall owners, practicing counting in Chinese, trying a very wide variety of foods...

Many apologies if these pictures look unappealing.

Basically one long strip of food "stalls"

The fruit was awesome, but the tent in the background was the very best (below)...

My absolute favorite part of the market: these bread things.

Savory on the left, sweet on the right.

SO good - perfectly crispy on the outside, soft in the middle, and warm all over.

0.6¥ each (around 10 cents...)

PLUS the sweetest family ever ran it (mother and son pictured). We had many attempted conversations and many successfully exchanged smiles.

One of the restaurants. They made super spicy soup and meat filled pancakes. Actually really good.

Nuts.

The Chinese love them. All the time. Everywhere.

Raw meat. Sitting outside all day long. Even in the sun.

One of the few things I did not brave.

Often you will see whole animals on the table there.

I do love that he is so proud of his stand though.

How you buy the meat.... just ride your bike right on up.

And.... more raw meat.

Note that if you don't want to bother with the rest of the chicken, you can just buy the chicken feet by themselves (lower left corner).

(When it is warmer, they have whole pens of live chickens and pigeons for you to take your pick. They will do the honors for you right there on the spot.)

Annnnd raw fish.

Also when it is warmer, they have tons of live ones sploshing around (onto nearby people... or food) in a shallow container.

Beans and grains

Every type of tofu ever.

Ask Elizabeth about how much she loves tofu.

Gelatinous pig's blood and I think some type of tofu.

This truck usually comes in filled to the brim with fruit.

Today, it's pomelos (think giant grapefruit the size of your head). Definitely tasty. Definitely don't eat too many slices at once.....

My personal favorite veggie stand.

The fruit was about comparable to US prices, but the vegetables were about a dollar or two for a week's worth....

Please keep in mind that this is the same area where those fish were sploshing around or chickens wondering about.

Yes, we washed our food well.... to say the least.

I actually really don't like these (basically these little fruits coated in sugar), but this guy was adamant about giving me one for free, even though I refused many times. He was always very excited to say hi whenever I walked by, proudly practicing his one English word of "hello!" each time.